I have been both eagerly anticipating and dreading the debut of ABC’s new sitcom, Fresh Off the Boat. The Asian-American experience isn’t one that’s been depicted in many TV shows or movies, so the possibility of seeing a show based around an Asian family, largely from the viewpoint of an 11-year-old boy attempting to fit in and find his cultural identity, was very exciting to me.
I read Eddie Huang’s memoir, upon which this series is based, largely because of my interest in cooking and Asian food. But after flipping through the book, I realized that Huang had many more important — and funny — things to say about his love of hip-hop and growing up in an Asian family trying to make a life for themselves moving from Washington, D.C. to Orlando, Fla. When I heard that Fresh Off the Boat was being developed into a sitcom, it made sense to me. This was fertile material, stuff we hadn’t seen on TV before.
Yes, Margaret Cho had All-American Girl (also on ABC) just over 20 years ago, but that was hardly a success. And from what I recall of it, the show didn’t feel very authentic. Not just from an Asian-American point of view, but it wasn’t true to Cho’s comedy. It felt like her material and those characters were being shoehorned into the idea of a traditional American sitcom. Cho’s stories of the production were far more entertaining than anything ever created on the show.
So when I read Huang write about the issues he had with Fresh Off the Boat‘s producer in New York magazine a few weeks ago, I cringed. I certainly didn’t expect Huang’s stories to be translated completely faithfully to the screen, but I hoped that the show would retain his voice, which made the book — and Huang himself — so entertaining. Yet it shouldn’t have been a surprise that someone as outspoken as Huang, fueled by his desire to tell an inherent truth, would balk at any changes the production might make.
Taking that into consideration, the only fair thing to do was wait for the show and try to judge it on its own merits. Looking at Fresh Off the Boat solely as a TV comedy, it works. It’s funny, which is what ultimately matters most. After watching its first two episodes, the show doesn’t appear to follow Huang’s book closely, but I wasn’t really expecting that to happen. The spirit of Huang’s book and life story feel like they’re present, and hopefully that holds true as this first season progresses.
The pilot episode does a smart thing by beginning with an image many viewers may not have seen before: An Asian kid dressing up hip-hop style, in Orlando Magic apparel. Right away, Fresh Off the Boat makes it clear that this is going to be a different show.
And just in case anyone is unnerved by that visual, it’s quickly deflated when Eddie (Hudson Yang) shows his mother (Constance Wu) and she immediately says no way. But her refusal is based on how much the outfit costs, not on what her son wants to wear. That’s an important distinction. Eddie’s mother knows how important this stuff is to him, even if she doesn’t understand it. She wants him to be true to himself, which is a prevalent theme for the show.
But Fresh Off the Boat isn’t preachy — at least no more preachy than any other sitcom that tries to tie everything together at the end and perhaps pass along the lesson that its characters learned. The show doesn’t depend on the lazy humor of an Asian family trying to adapt to an almost entirely white community either. Rather than fall on easy stereotypes, the writing is more creative.
How do the kids fit in at school? Eddie had a tough time as expected, but his younger brother Emery already found a girlfriend on his first day. The mother, Jessica, joins a neighborhood group of rollerblading women who want to talk about Melrose Place. (The show takes place in 1995.) She’s also awed by the vast, sterile supermarkets of suburbia, compared to the cramped, frenzied environment of open-air markets back in Chinatown. The father, Louis (Randall Park), is inexplicably trying to revive a failed country steakhouse.
Though Eddie is presumably the main character of Fresh Off the Boat, since this is presumably his story, the breakout character of the show is going to be Jessica. Perhaps her character plays to the “Tiger Mom” stereotype a bit (which is addressed in voiceover narration), as the controlling Asian mother and wife who wants her children to excel in school and thinks Louis is far too soft in how he runs his business.
But she’s frequently given the funniest moments, such as when she thinks a free tortilla chip sample means she gets the entire bowl or she runs over a group of college kids who pull a “dine-and-dash” at her husband’s restaurant. Jessica has some surprises too, like when she lectures Eddie’s school principal about how he handled an incident of racial prejudice. Wu pulls off it off with hilariously deadpan line readings and a talent for knowing when to exaggerate Jessica’s stern behavior a bit.
As an Asian-American, I could definitely relate to Eddie’s struggles to fit in at school. Our experiences weren’t entirely similar. My father was American, so that was a part of my identity. My mother was also very concerned with us fitting in with our American friends, so we didn’t have ethnic food packed in our lunches, for example, something that causes Eddie embarrassment at school. (Looking back now, we all wish she had tried to maintain that part of our heritage a little more strongly.)
But anyone can relate to the desire to fit in as an kid. What’s important to you? Who do you want to be? Will the people in your life and your surrounding environment allow you to be true to yourself? On the show, that doesn’t just apply to Eddie, but to his parents as well. And that struggle is something we all deal with at some point in our lives. That’s what makes Fresh Off the Boat such an appealing show, one that hopefully gets a chance to find success.
